Lactose phenylosazone anhydride

Although Fischer described a lactose phenylosazone anhydride in 1887, little attention was paid to substances of this type until 1935 when Diels and Meyer reported the isolation of monoanhydrides of D-glucose phenylosazone, D-galactose phenylosazone, D-xylose phenylosazone, L-arabinose phenylosazone, lactose phenylosazone, and cellobiose phenylosazone, as well as a dianhydride of maltose phenylosazone, by boiling the corresponding osazones in alcoholic solution with a little sulfuric acid. Because of the apparent identity of the D-glucose phenylosazone anhydride with the 3,6-anhydro-D-glucose phenylosazone of Fischer and Zach, Diels and Meyer formulated these compounds as 3,6-anhydrides. 

Lactose phenylosazone heptaacetate yielded lactose phenylosazone anhydride hydrate,a compound previously isolated by Fischer and by Diels and Meyer. This compound also yields a pentaacetate the same structural possibilities occur here as in the case of the cellobiose phenylosazone anhydride mentioned above. 

Lactosone was first prepared by the hydrochloric acid decomposition of the phenylosazone,1 although it had been noted that, in acid solutions, lactose phenylosazone forms an anhydride.197 Since its discovery,17 the benzaldehyde method has usually been employed,6-10-28 because it avoids the risks of osone hydrolysis and of alteration to the osazone. Lactosone is hydrolyzed by hot, dilute, mineral acid to D-glucosone and D-galactose.1-6 It reacts with cyanide to form an analog of iminoascorbic acid which, on acid treatment, is converted into a mixture of D-glucoascorbic acid and D-galactose.10... 

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